Autonomous mapping for inspection of 3D structures

This paper proposes a method based on cooperation between climbing and ground robots in order to address the mapping problem for autonomous inspection of 3D structures. In the proposed method ground robots act as a mobile observer with a wide coverage for a climbing robot, to detect and estimate the size of the structure being climbed. We will present a case study in which multiple terrain robots provide the model of a structure which should be explored by a pole climbing robot. Each terrain robot is equipped with a low cost wide angle VGA camera, and some markers are fixed on the climbing robot. At each navigation step, the climbing robot and terrain robots cooperate to model a part of the structure which should be explored by the climbing robot.